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DANIEL WEBSTER 






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DANIEL AVEBSTERi 

To adequately depict the character of a m an who has 
achieved distinction in a single line of human endeavor is 
"no easylaS. When, therefore, the subject of your address 
has been preeminent in at least three distinct fields, and 
your time is of necessity limited, the attempt to do him 
justice is well nigh hopeless. 

Ordinarily we count that man great who has so far sur- 
passed his fellows in any single line of work as to reach a 
commanding eminence. But when we find one who has out- 
distanced all competitors in at least three different paths we 
have no superlatives which exactly fit his case. Until that 
fatal seventh day of March Daniel Webster was the most 
"popular man this country has ever known. He was simply 
idolized by the bar, the bench, and the people; was said to 
be the greatest man that ever lived, a veritable demi god — 
"the god-like Daniel." Indeed it was said that no man ever 
satisfied the imagination so completely. And these words, 
mark you, came from his contemporaries. For more than 
thirty years he was the leading lawyer, orator, and states- 
man of his country. He was for eight years a member of 
the House of Representatives, nineteen yeai^sa^ United States 
senatorTand five years Secretary of State. 

True Mr. Webster was not elected to the Presidency. But 

who"of our really great men have been? He belongedjo, 

1 This paper was prepared as an address by Justice Horace E. Deemer, of the 
Si^preme Court of Iowa, and was first delivered by him before the Grant Club 
( Des Moines ) on January 15, 1903. 



that class of men too great to be President — men like Clay 
and Blaine to whom the title of President would have added 
nothing either to fame or honor. 

Despite the tenacity with which men cling to life longev- 
ity is not always an unmixed blessing. Had Lord Bacon 
never risen to the highest honors in the state and then been 
degraded by the judgment of his peers and branded as "the 
wisest, brightest, and meanest of mankind"; had Burke 
shuffled off this mortal coil before he broke with his party in 
England and was driven by the horrors of the French Revo- 
lution into the ranks of his adversaries ; had Blaine remained 
in the cabinet of his chief, instead of permitting that insati- 
able itching for the Presidency to take possession of his 
being and drive him into the Minneapolis convention as a 
competitor for the presidential nomination; had Clay the 
great compromiser never compromised himself on the ques- 
tion of the Mexican War, it would have been better for their 
reputation and they all doubtless would have been held in 
higher esteem than they are to-day. And so it would seem 
that but for that fatal "seventh of March speech" Webster 
would have gone down into history as one of the greatest 
men of his time, if not of all time. 

Strange, indeed, is it not, that three of these men, each 
regarded for a time as almost angelic, fell through ambition. 
.Had all the ends they aimed at been their country's, their 
God's and truth's, their names on history's page would not 
have been stained as they now are by foibles seemingly inci- 
dent to great and small alike. Great men stand in such a 
fierce light that their mistakes cannot be overlooked or ex- 
tenuated. 



Webster was compelled to expiate his mistakes in the jeers 
and taunts of his former friends and admirers. You will 
remember that Theodore Parker said of him: — "Oh, Web- 
ster! AVebster! would to God I had died for thee. I have 
long mourned for him as for no living or departed man. 
He blasted us with scornful lightning. To him to die was 
gain, life was the only loss." Such expressions as these 
were common. " AVebster is a fallen star. Lucifer descend- 
ing from heaven." "AVebster has placed himself in the 
dark line of Apostates." 

AVTiittier named him Ichabod and mourned for him as one 

dead : 

Let not the land, 

Once proud of him 

Insult him now, 

Nor brand with deeper shame his dim. 

Dishonored brow. 

But let its humblest sons instead. 

From sea to lake, 

A long lament as for the dead 

In sadness make. 

Failing to satisfy his itching palm for the Presidency, 
deserted by former friends, conscious of unfaithfulness to 
earlier ideals, clouds gathered around the evening of his life 
and he died like many another great man, soured by unsatis- 
fied political aspirations. Shortly before his death he said: 
' 'I have given my life to law and politics. Law is uncertain 
and politics are utterly vain." The moral fiber of the man 
did not, it seems, comport ^dth his mental strength. 

But it is not of the man's mistakes personal or political 
that you wish to hear or that it is pleasant for me to dwell 
upon. He had the "will's defects, the blood's excess, the 



6 

earthy humors that oppress the radiant mind." But 'tis 
"his greatness, not his littleness" that "concerns mankind." 
The public may have a right to insist on personal purity in 
her public men, but it is the good that men do which should 
live after them, not the evil which should be interred with 
their bones. When men are called from earthly scenes 
"'tis not ours to gauge" but rather that Omnipotent Judge 
to whom alone we are accountable for our personal conduct. 

It is then of his acknowledged supremacy, his unrivalled 
superiority in a triple aspect of which I would speak. 

Not often is one justified in referring to the personal at- 
tributes and characteristics of the man. But in this instance 
they seem so prominent and so peculiarly identified with the 
subject in the different relations of which I shall speak — 
as lawyer, orator, and statesman — that I shall take the lib- 
erty of attempting, with the aid of the splendid likeness 
now before you, to give you a notion of the real man. And 
first let me say that although born in New England his par- 
ents were not Puritans. They came from the North of 
England, whereas the Puritans were almost wholly from the 
eastern part of that little isle. Neither by birth nor by 
education was he a Puritan. He went to Boston after he 
had acquired his education and his habits of thought had 
become fixed, hence he had few of the virtues and none of 
the faults of that people — least of all their "pronounced 
provincialism. " I speak of this because of his broad spirit of 
nationality, his catholicity, which marked his whole conduct 
and which finally became the guiding star of his public 
career. 

The very makeup of the man seems symbolic, and to 



most of us he stands as the physical embodiment of the Fed- 
eral Union. This may be due to some extent to the litera- 
ture of the school books, but I think it is bottomed on a 
surer foundation. 

He was indeed a child of nature; "like her he was un- 
ethical; like her he was not revolutionary; and like her he 
applied his powers along the lines of normal development. " 
By nature he was a inistic, yet bore the marks of gentle 
blood in shapely extremities and well proportioned limbs. 

Of ordinary height, large and compact of body, weighing 
a little less than two hundred pounds, with a swarthy com- 
plexion which gave him the cognomen of "Black Dan," 
straight black hair, a massive head, broad and lofty fore- 
head, finely cut high bred massive features of no known 
type, crag like brows with very dark deep set eyes, which 
shone in action like a forge, "like charcoal in the bottom 
of a deep dark well," or, as Carlyle said, "dull dark eyes 
underneath a precipice of brows like dull anthracite furnaces 
needing only to be blown," ivith massive jaw and mastive 
mouth artistically arched and "accurately closed," dignified, 
apparently cold, and given a little to pomposity, which in- 
creased with years, a tragic melancholy expression which 
seemed prophetic of the future, to which should be added 
an harmonious and melodious voice of great flexibility and 
power, almost always dressed in a blue swallow tailed coat 
with brass buttons and a yellow waistcoat — such was the 
man of whom Parton spoke, when he said that when he rose 
to speak he looked like "Jupiter in a yellow waistcoat." 

The impression which he made upon his fellow men is well 
known. You will remember that Avhen he visited England 



8 

an English navvy on the streets of Liverpool pointed at Mr. 
Webster and said : ' 'There goes the King. " Sidney Smith 
said: "Good heavens he is a small cathedral by himself, a 
living lie, because no man on earth can be as great as he 
looks. " When Thorwaldsen sav/ his head in a studio at Rome 
he said: "Aha! a design for Jupiter I see"; and could not 
be convinced that he was a living American. * 

Carlyle who was not much given to overpraise of Amer- 
icans, or of anyone else for that matter, after seeing him 
wrote to Emerson: "He is a magnificent specimen. As a 
logic fencer or parliamentary Hercules one would incline to 
back him at first sight against all the extant world. A dig- 
nified perfectly bred man — though not of English breeding. 
A man worthy of the best reception among us, and meeting 
such I understand." 

All in all there is no man in history who came into the 
world so well equipped for his mission. Shakespeare must 
have had such an one in mind when he made Hamlet say: 

The front of Jove himself: — 

An eye like Mars to threaten and command; 
A station like the herald Mercury 
New lighted on a heaven kissing hill; 
A combination and a form indeed, 
Where every god did seem to set his seal, 
To give the world assurance of a man. 

You may well imagine how such a person full of his sub- 
ject, gifted with sui'passing powers of speech, careful in the 
selection of his words, blessed with an unusual memory, 
forceful and convincing in his utterances, which were full of 
harmony and melody, affected those who heard him. A 
bitter opponent who listened to his famous "seventh of 



9 

March speech" said that when Mr. Webster, speaking of 
secession, asked, "What is to become of me?" I was 
thrilled with a sense of some awful imj)ending calamity. 

Indeed his personality was such that even when he uttered 
a few commonplaces, as he frequently did, especially in his 
declining years, people Avent away avowing that they were 
of the greatest foresight and wisdom. 

Webster's mind was essentially synthetic and analytic. 
It was neither creative nor ingenious. Indeed, few lawyers 
have creative genius. Their habits of thought tend to curb 
the imagination and are toward conservatism. They do not 
as a rule create anything — but disturbance — and blindly and 
un(piestioningly follow precedent. They become strong 
logicians and adepts in the art of refinement, have great 
vigor of intellectual grasp and penetrating judgment, but are 
rarely, indeed, creative. The creative genius is so rare 
everyw^here that when he comes he attracts the whole world. 

Webster could construct on old foundations, but had no 
faculty for laying new ones. His mental processes were 
along historical lines — evolutionary and not revolutionary — 
and he had a very clear perception of that increasing pui-j^ose 
which has run throughout the ages. He was a great student 
of history, and his Plymouth Hock oration is a clear index 
to his habits of thought. There, as you remember, he traced 
the causes which, beginning with the reformation, led in the 
fullness of time to the colonization of America and to the 
establishment of those principles of liberty which even then 
gave promise of the mighty nation we have now grown to 
be. In this respect he was distinctly superior to Hamilton, 
but greatly inferior to him in creative power and in all that 



10 

goes to make up the real man of genius. Indeed, I think 
Hamilton one of the greatest political geniuses the world has 
ever known. 

Finding such wonderful powers of synthesis and analysis 
as Mr. Webster possessed coupled with singular purity of 
style and perfectly sane mental processes we may well ex- 
pect eminent success in his chosen profession — the Law. 
This he surely had. Notwithstanding his political mistakes 
no one will deny his preeminence at the bar. As would 
naturally be expected, I like to dwell on this side of his 
career. You will remember that his mother said he would 
"come to something or nothing, and she was not sure 
which." The turning point in his career was his refusal to 
accept the clerkship Qf^thg,,£ounty Court at a reasonably 
fair salary, much to his father's disgust. But you, of course, 
will not be interested in the details of his professional life, 
and it is too long a chapter to be considered in a single ad- 
dress. Suffice it to say that Mr. Webster was what we would 
call here in the AVest "an all around lawyer." He did not 
specialize, but took all kinds of cases — even criminal ones, 
in one of which he gained great fame as an orator. 

There is no justification for now considering any part of 
his career as a lawyer except where in that capacity he had 
to do with cases of great political significance. No other 
lawyer has so ably expounded the Constitution in the fomm 
and on the platform as AVebster; and no one save Marshall, 
the Great Chief Justice, did so much to maintain and pre- 
serve it on its true foundations and in its just proportions. 
Webster and IMarshall were of like political princij^les 
and worked together for a liberal and proper inteipretation 



11 

of the Constitution. Marshall of course spoke the more 
authoritative words; but they were delivered in the quiet 
recesses of the court room. A herald was needed to raise 
the people up to a proper conception of these judicial utter- 
ances and to inspire them with a love for the great country 
which Marshall was so quietly yet so efficiently constructing 
in his chambers. Webster thus cooperated with Marshall; 
but he had a wider field, larger audiences, and a more far 
reaching voice. 

Some judicial questions are so closely related to politics, 
in the larger sense of that term, that it is hard to divorce 
them; and it is true, I think, that Marshall's fame rests 
chiefly on his statesmanship, although expressed in the form 
of judicial decisions.^ Had Marshall been a folloAver of 
Jefferson, instead of Hamilton, it is not difficult to imagine 
the consti-uction he would have placed upon our Great 
Charter. 

Fortunately for posterity most of Mr. Webster's great 
forensic efforts have been preserved. In this respect he has 
a decided advantage over most of the great lawyers of his ( 

time — and there were many of them. Hamilton was no 
doubt a great lawyer, although he was admitted to the bar 
after only four months of study. But none of his legal 
arguments have been preserved. Indeed the lawyer's fame 
is generally local and evanescent. Mr. Webster was en- 
gaged in so many great and important cases and early in 
his career had won such fame as an orator that most of his 
great efforts were reported and we are now able to read them 

1 See Emlin McClain's article on Chief Justice Marshall as a Constructive 
Statesman in The Iowa Journal of History and Politics^ Vol. I, p. 427. 



12 

substantially as delivered. It is said that few great speeches 
read well, but this is not true of Mr. AVebster's main efforts. 
He had the happy faculty of breathing the breath of life 
into the most ponderous sentences. 

It is not my pui'pose to take up his forensic arguments in 
detail or to make an analysis of the questions involved and 
the points decided in the important cases in which he was 
engaged. One case, however, must be specially mentioned. 
It is the somewhat famous case of McCullough vs. Mary- 
land, wherein the Federal Supreme Court first announced the 
great principle of liberal construction which was to serve for 
all future time as a beacon light in the interpretation of the 
Federal Constitution. For the purpose of pointing a way to 
the possible solution of impending difficulties let me here 
briefly state what was there decided. 

First. It was held that if certain means are apparently 
necessary to carry into effect any of the powers expressly 
given by the Constitution, and be an appropriate measure to 
that end not prohibited by the Constitution, the degree of 
its necessity is a question of legislative discretion and not of 
judicial cognizance. 

Second. That if an end be legitimate and within the 
scope of the Constitution, all means which are appropriate 
and adapted to that end may be employed. 

Third. That the power of establishing a corporation, 
while not an end of government, may become a means of 
exercising powers given by the Constitution, and may be 
exercised by that government. 

With these premises for the first member of the syllogism, . 
and power to boiTow money, to regulate commerce, and to 



18 

raise revenue, expressly granted by the Constitution, as the 
second, the Court held, in accord with Mr. AVebster's argu- 
ment, that Congress had power to incorj^orate a bank. 

I wish to emphasize the importance of these doctrines as 
suggesting a possible solution of one of the troublesome 
questions now before the American people. If Congress 
may on such slender threads incorporate banks, why may it 
not require the incorporation of those big corporations largely 
engaged in interstate commerce, often with a tendency toward 
monopoly, which the President has denominated trusts, un- 
der the power given by the Federal Constitution to regulate 
commerce? This would not only enforce publicity, but 
place the whole matter under federal regulation and control. 
Would it not be well for our present day statesman to turn 
back to the argument of Mr. Webster in McCullough vs. 
Maryland^ and to the very able opinion of the great Chief 
Justice, for light on a question which seems to be so per- 
plexing ? This may not be a solution, but it has occurred to 
me that it is worth investigating. 

What objection is there to a conservative federal law for 
the incorporation of companies engaged in interstate com- 
merce? Nothing it seems to me save the old notion of 
"States rights." What is the constitutional objection to 
such an enactment? None, as I believe. Nearly all new 
questions may be settled by reference to fundamental prin- 
ciples, if we but search deep enough for them. 

The other distinction I would have you notice is that the 
attitude of the majority in Congress with reference to our 
recent acquisitions of territory and the final decision in the 
insular cases was bottomed on Mr. Webster's idea yvith. 



14 

reference to the "March of the Constitution." At the risk 
of trespassing on your patience, I am going to quote what 
Mr. Webster said in reply to Mr. Calhoun, who was contend- 
ing that the Constitution, ex proprio vigore, extended over 
all the territory belonging to the United States. 

The Constitution, as the gentleman contends, extends over the ter- 
ritories. How does it get there? I am surprised to hear a gentleman 
so distinguished as a strict constructionist affirming that the Consti- 
tution extends to territories without showing us any clause in the 
Constitution in any way leading to that result; and to hear the gen- 
tleman maintaining that position, without showing us any way in 
which such a result could be inferred, increases my surprise. 

After showing that the Constitution had nothing to do 
with land titles, domestic relations, or property rights, and 
that the State or ten-itory had no law but such as it derived 
from the Constitution, and was entirely without government, 
he proceeded as follows: 

When new territory has been acquired it has always been subject 
to the laws of Congress, to such laws as Congress thought proper to 
pass for its immediate government during its territorial existence, 
during the preparatory state in which it was to remain, until it was 
ready to come into the Union as one of the family of States. 

This matter should no doubt be regarded as a closed inci- 
dent, but it demonstrates in a most effective way Mr. Web- 
ster's great prescience and his unusual ability as a lawyer. 
He was unquestionably the leader of perhaps the strongest 
bar this country has ever had. To him as much, perhaps, 
as to Marshall is due the stability, the perpetuity, and the 
destiny of the Federal Union from the standpoint of the 
forum. 



lo 

A good lawyer may be a great orator, although he need 
not be; a great orator may be a good lawyer, although this 
i8 by no means universal. But to be a great statesman and 
a great lawyer one must also be gifted with adequate powers 
of speech. Time will not permit of long dwelling on Mr. 
Webster's ability as an orator. From the description already 
given of the man it is evident that he had all of the physical 
attributes of the orator. But he did not rely on these alone. 
He was a great student, a diligent reader of the classics. 
He read much from Shakespeare, Milton, Johnson, and 
Burke — the latter I fancy he greatly resembled, although 
unlike the latter he did not keep on refining while his hear- 
ers were thinking of dining. In political history there was 
nothing which escaped him. His taste was excellent and 
he excelled in three almost incompatible forms of speech — at 
the forum, in the halls of legislation, and before the people. 
He has been compared with Hamilton, with Clay, with 
Choate, with Burke, and with Pitt — indeed with all the 
great orators both ancient and modern. Competent judges 
have declared that he suffers nothing from such comparisons. 
Senator Lodge, who has given the matter great thought, de- 
clares that he is unsurpassed as an orator, that his addresses 
combine exact balance, the living force and freshness of the 
spoken word, with the literary qualities which alone insure 
endurance. AVebster did not have Burke's richness of im- 
agery, and before a jury he fell behind Choate. He was 
not as florid as Chatham, and did not have the personal 
magnetism of Clay; but all in all he was the equal if not the 
superior of any of them. His oratory was at all times per- 
fectly sane and sound and admirably suited to the occasion. 



16 

There is nothing finer in the history of forensic eloquence 
than his speech for the prosecution in the White murder 
case. 

The Plymouth oration on an entirely difterent occasion is 
well nigh perfect, and the two Bunker hill orations will sur- 
vive even the monument itself. His closing appeal for his 
alma mater in the Dartmouth College case, which it is said 
brought tears to the eyes of the staid Justices of the Su- 
preme Court, has never been equalled and can never be re- 
peated. It is the only known case of a successful appeal to 
the sympathy of an appellate tribunal. Ordinarily such 
efforts are entirely out of place in a court of last resort and 
fall upon unresjDonsive ears. One must be a master of all 
the arts and tricks of oratory to indulge in them. 

Mr. Webster's reply to Hayne in the United States Sen- 
ate is by common consent regarded as the greatest political 
oration that has ever been delivered. Indeed, his labors, 
his studies, and the thoughts of a lifetime were in prepara- 
tion for this splendid exposition and defense of the Consti- 
tution. Running through all his prior orations you will 
notice a warp on which all his ideas regarding the govern- 
ment and the Constitution were woven. His life had been a 
constant preparation for that supreme effort. It is said that 
a single speech of Mirabeau's ushered in the French Revo- 
lution. Undoubtedly in the light of history Webster's ad- 
dress in reply to Hayne furnished the inspiration which 
finally throttled rebellion. 

Webster was not a great constructive statesman. But he 
did quite as much for his country as some of his more bril- 
liant and meteoric compatriots. Born into the Federalist 



17 

jmrty of Hamilton and Marshall, lie was nevertheless inde- 
pendent of party and always sacrificed its principles when 
~tEe'y seemed to conflict with his strong'sense of NatTonalism: 
:Ztfter"the demise"o'fl}he Federalist party through the elec- 
tion of Jefferson, Mr. Webster identified himself with the 
A^^ligs, where he naturally associated himself with Clay and 
Adams in opposition to Jackson, Benton, and Van Buren, 
and thus paved the wa^ to leaders^^ which he 

eventually ruined. 

" S^ opposed the embargo act, opposed the conduct of the 
war of 1812, and insisted on a naval war instead of exhaust- 
ing our resources on Canada — indeed he always stood as most 
statesmen have for a strong navy — but he had little sym- 
pathy with the then prevalent Federalist threats of secession 
on' account of that war. Indeed, he openly discountenanced 
the measures which led to the Hartford Convention and kept 
his native State out of that movement which was, perhaps, 
quite as antagonistic to the Union as were the South Caro- 
lina nullification acts. He favored a national or United 
States Bank, but insisted upon its being specie paying, and 
was strongly opposed to paper money in all its forms. He 
was always a foe to in-edeemable paper whether in times of 
war or in times of peace, and at this early day rendered yeo- 
man service to the cause of sound moneyr*" Always for works 
of internal improvement and for the development of the 
great AVest, he did not share in the common New England 
view that the'growth of the heart of the Continent would be 
detrimental to the sea board. Vigorous in his opposition to 
the "Holy Alliance," he first announced the duty of the. 
United States toward the oppmssed of any: land^aM^wnte^ 



/ 



\ 



18 

the way to the modern doctrine of intervention. As would 
naturally be expected, he threw his whole soul into Jackson's 
"force bill," which authorized the President to call out the 
United States troops to enforce the laws of the land and to 
suppress secession and treason, and in this connection he 
made that great speech known in his works as The Consti- 
tution not a comiyact hetioeen Sovereign States, paving the 
Avay to the magnificent rej^ly which he was to make to Mr. 
\ Hayne's argument for the right of a State to secede. He 
averted another war with England through peaceable settle- 
ment of the Northeast boundary dispute, and finally settled 
by diplomacy the question over which the two countries con- 
tended without result in the war of 1812. 

In the Cabinet he displayed as high qualities and attained 
as great a measure of success as any j^erson who has ever 
held such a portfolio. But you are waiting I know for what 
I have to say regarding his attitude on the tariff question. 
This problem has had a most peculiar history. It has played 
such an important part in politics past and present, that I 
cannot hope to adequately present the matter from an his- 
torical standpoint in the short time allowed me. 

Every one knows, of course, that Hamilton was a protec- 
tionist, and that largely through his efforts the first Con- 
gress passed a protective measure which received the ap- 
proval of General Washington. The New England Feder- 
alists unaware of the latent possibilities of their babbling 
brooks and running streams, were opposed to Hamilton's 
notions, and the large majority of them were free traders. 
They were engaged in foreign commerce, and their merchant 
marine were plying all waters. Whoever has visited old 



19 

Salem and her Essex and Peabody institutes ^vill understand 
the force of these suggestions. Strange as it may seem, the 
South and the West under the~leadershii> ^f Mr. Calhoun 
initiated the protective policy as a party measure in the year 
._181.^-_Webster, a new England representative, opposed it 
as against the interests of his constituents, and again in 1820 
and in 1824 he stood as the champion of free commerce, de- 
clariiig the protective policjjr pernicious, if not unconstitu- 
tional, and subversive of commercial intercourse between 
nations. >-—'»'»««« 

1 But in 1828 when a bill which was so much worse from 

jthe free trader's standpoint as to be called the "bill of 

/abominations" originating in an agitation by woolen manu- 

) facturers, which enter^^rise had but recently come into exist- 

I ence by reason of the protective policy, came before Con- 

\gress, Webster spoke and voted for it, and ever afterward 

acted with the protectionists. He then became an advocate 

of the "American system" fathered by Henry Clay and 

matured by James G. Blaine. Indeed, he refused to go 

with Clay in his compromise measure to thwart the puii^ose 

of the "Force bill" which was aimed at Nullification, the 

exponent of which was the same Calhoun who was largely 

responsible for the protective policy. 

This course on the part of Mr. Webster led to the oft re- 
peated charge of inconsistency. For a moment I wish to 
examine that charge in the light of some reflections on the 
tariff policy. And first I want to make an admission — a 
personal one it must be, for I speak for no party — that 
from a purely academic and theoretical standpoint the free 
trader has the better of the argument. His theory is beau- 






20 

tiful and enticing though purely Utopian and visionary. It 
is such stuft* as dreams are made of, and entirely unsuited to 
our conditions and environment. Next I want to confess 
that protection originally was and may even now be con- 
ceded to be an expedient — but an expedient now so long 
followed that it has become a policy which cannot be de- 
parted from without menacing all our business interests and 
sapping the very foundations of our economic policy. By 
reason of these facts nearly all men of affairs are protection- 
ists. The theory of free trade is the philosophy of the 
cloister, while the policy of protection is the wisdom of the 
workshop. 

Daniel Webster like Thomas JeflPerson was as a theorist 
a free trader, but as a man of affairs and as an exponent of 
sound economic policy for this country he, like Jefferson, 
became a protectionist. And such, indeed, has been the 
evolution in the belief of most people who have studied the 
question in its practical aspects, who have been a part of 
history, or who have studied statistics. 

But whatever the point of view all, I think, will agree 
with Mr. Webster in his final conclusion that when a policy 
has once been established — expedient though it may be — it 
should not be changed to meet every suggestion of inequal- 
ity. Believing that many industries had been built up on 
the faith of a protective policy he declared that it was the 
duty of the government at that juncture to protect and not 
to destroy, and that so far as was in his power he should 
hold steady the degree of protection already bestowed. He 
did not believe in strangling those industries which had been 
lured into life through promises of protection. It is not too 



21 

mucli to claim that when Mr. Webster came to observe the 
practical workings of the policy which he had opposed, when 
he saw about him in his own New England theretofore un- 
tamed and uncontrolled forces of nature bridled and har- 
nessed for the diversion of industry and the diffusion of 
wealth, witnessed the steady and ample growth of the home 
market, the creation of opportunity for labor and Yankee 
inventiveness, and how closely agriculture, commerce, and 
manufacture were linked together, he modified to some ex- 
tent at least his scholastic views regarding the tariff. 

Throughout all these remarks you may have discovered 
the thread which if followed leads to the concluding para- 
graph. All that Webster did and all that he said seem to 
have been in preparation for the supreme moment of his life. 
In all his public addresses it will be found the strong, the 
predominant note of Nationalism. He invariably kept step 
to the music of the Union. He supported Jackson in his 
efforts to coerce South Carolina and accepted Calhoun's chal- 
lenge on the doctrine of "States rights." Unconsciously, 
perhaps, in his advocacy of internal improvements, the build- 
ing of national roads, the dredging of rivers, the establish- 
ment of light houses, and the chartering of a national bank, 
he was paving the way to that great effort which Avas to make 
his name secure for all time and give him a unique place in 
history. 

The Constitution of 1789 meant something different in 
those days from what it did in 1861 and from what it does 
to-day. Hamilton seems to have been the only man among 
the Fathers who had any clear conception of the government 
they were creating, and even he used the then rife doctrines 



22 

of possible separation as a postulate for the defeat of Buit 
when the latter was a candidate for Governor of the State of 
New York. He made no public protest which I can find 
against what in those times seemed in a measure at least to 
be accepted doctrine, to-wit: the "right of a State to 
secede." 

Viewed in the light of impartial history we can have more 
charity at this late day for our erring brothers of the South. 
You have already heard of the famous Kentucky and Vir- 
^ ginia Resolutions; but you have not been informed, per- 
\ haps, that the same doctrines were prevalent in New Eng- 
j land; that the Hartford Convention, convened in the town 
/ bearing that name, and, composed of tried and true Feder- 
alists, also resolved in favor of the right of nullification and 
secession. Josiah Quincy, a member of Congress from 
Massachusetts, said in 1814 in speaking on a bill for the ad- 
mission of Louisiana into the Union: 

If this bill passes it is my deliberate opinion, that it is a virtual 
dissolution of this Union; that it will free the States from their 
moral obligation, and as it will be the right of all so it will be the 
duty of one definitely to prepare for separation — amicably if they 
can, violently if they must. 

In 1844 the legislature of Massachusetts passed a resolu- 
tion to the effect that the project for the annexation of Texas 
unless arrested at the threshhold may tend to drive these 
\ States into a dissolution of the Union. Mr. Madison in the 
I federalist' admitted the doctrine of secession. Indeed, the 
/ Abolitionists of the North were boldly declaring "No Union 
f with Slaveholders." 

The spirit of true Nationalism was of slow growth, and 



23 

the idea of divided sovereignty difficult of comprehension. 
Indeed, it must frankly be confessed that the latter is not 
perfectly understood at this day, despite the baptism of blood 
which the Constitution from the beginning seemed destined 
to receive. 

Had the country remained as it was when the Constitution 
was framed, it is doubtful if it Avould ever have become any- 
thing more than a mere confederacy. In those days States 
were treated as the units of a government of delegated 
powers, and men naturally regarded their allegiance to these 
constituent parts paramount. State pride was peculiarly 
potent, and the government was considered simply a com- 
pact between sovereign States which might at any time be 
dissolved. 

That men who had been instnimental in building up these 
Commonwealths, who had watched their growth and devel- 
opment with paternal solicitude, should put the State above 
the nation is not to be wondered at; and at this remote period 
we may look back with much charity on those misguided 
men who recognized the sovereignty of the State as para- 
mount to their obligations to the Union. While it was gen- 
erally believed by all that the new government was to be a 
nation in the family of nations the exact nature of that gov- 
ernment was not clearly understood, and the spirit of Nation- 
alism was the product of time. 

With the acquisition of the Louisiana Territory, the really 
cementing influences of the war of 1812, the building of 
national turnpikes and canals, the establishment of light 
houses, the creation of a national bank, the decisions of 
Chief Justice JMarshall regarding the powers of the federal 



34 

government, and the enactment of the Fugitive Slave Law 
there came new notions regarding the Union. It was exer- 
cising national functions, it was bringing the citi;iens of the 
different States into closer relations, it was asserting all the 
powers incident to the strongest sovereignty, and the people 
were beginning to realize that it was their government and 
not a government composed of the several States. But 
while this spirit was evolving and growing there was at all 
times a very prevalent notion that the Constitution was a 
compact between sovereign States from which any one State 
had the right to withdraw at pleasure. This was freely 
asserted in and out of Congress, and while half-heartedly 
denied by a few, no one had as yet found voice for the true 
situation. 

Jackson, the good old Democrat, had a strong notion of 
the true state of affairs, and had he carried out his threat 
and hanged a few of the nullifiers early in the conflict pos- 
sibly we would have been saved from a dreadful revolution. 
But a great compromiser appeared. A man who had the 
enchanter's wand, the subtle influence of personal magnetism, 
and the indescribable qualities of personal leadership — 
Henry Clay — who, erroneously thinking that every good 
thing grew out of compromise, toyed with the secession 
sentiment until it was able through arrogance and bluster to 
fully entrench itself in a large number of States. Compro- 
mises are sometimes a good thing — indeed the Federal Con- 
stitution is in itself a bundle of compromises — but no one 
has ever been able to effectually compromise with an evil 
which offends against the conscience of mankind. Here is 
where Daniel Webster made his mistake. It is the rock on 



25 

wldch Henry Clay foundered, the principle which almost led 
us to destruction on the money question. 

Such then was the state of feeling in the year 1830. The 
challenges of the South had for a long time gone unanswered. 
Indeed, from the historical standpoint they seemed to many 
who wanted to believe otherwise almost unanswerable. Web- 
ster had undoubtedly come out second best in his debate 
with Calhoun, which had been waged on the historical side 
of the question, but he had paved the way to a proper con- 
ception of the government if it was to stand the strain of 
time. 

/ Such was the situation when an innocent resolution was 

I introduced by Mr. Foote of Connecticut in relation to the 

^ disposition of western public lands. The South seized upon 

'this as an attempt to prevent the development of the AVest; 

and Mr. Hayne, the gifted and theretofore invincible Senator 

Ifrom South Carolina, acting as the mouthpiece for Calhoun, 

Vho was the then presiding officer of the Senate and the 

genius of secession, made it the pretext for an assault upon 

/ New England and for the promulgation of the southern view 

Vof the fundamental law. Webster was engaged before the 

Supreme Court of the United States, but happened into the 

Vroom just as Hayne arose to make his first address. Noting 

the character of the opening remarks he remained until Mr. 

Hayne concluded, then took the floor and made a calm reply 

to the charge of hostility on the part of the East to^vard the 

West. Hayne was not satisfied and gave notice that he 

should resume the debate. Feeling that he was a match for 

Webster, that he had the historical aspect of the question in 

his favor, adroit and eloquent as he surely was, he went to 



i 



26 

his task with the confidence of one to whom victory is already- 
assured. Thursday, January 20, 1830, before an immense 
assemblage he fulfilled his promise, and in a speech of great 
length made a bitter attack on New England, on Webster 
personally, and on the patriotism of Massachusetts. He also 
made a full and what was supposed to be a final exposition 
of the doctrine of nullification, treating it historically and 
theoretically, and in the very Senate of the United States 
hoisted the red flag of nullification and secession. This 
addi'ess, strong and well sustained, delivered with that force 
and elegance of which the great Southerner was master, 
seemed unanswerable. Men of the North were dejected and 
walked the streets with dazed and downcast eyes. 

Knowing that Webster was to reply the next day his 
party, political, and personal friends trembled over the out- 
come. Some of them timidly called upon him to see if he 
appreciated the magnitude of his undertaking and the im- 
portance of his self-appointed task. To all he appeared in- 
different and to some entirely oblivious of the situation. 
They left him with much fear and trepidation and went into 
the Senate chamber the next morning doubtful of the issue 
and almost dumb with fright. Not so Mr. Webster. A¥hen 
he appeared in the Capitol he found it filled with men and 
women struggling for room and packed with eager and ex- 
pectant listeners. Mr. Everett, who had consulted him the 
evening before and who was now present to witness the 
gi'eat intellectual combat, was nonplussed over Webster's 
seeming indifference and apparent lack of preparation. But 
what an occasion it was for the orator. Eloquence, as the 
subject of this sketch once said, consists in the subject, the 



27 

man, and the occasion. Here all were present and all were 
utilized to the full measure. 

Those who have read Mr. Webster's speech remember how 
he soothed the troubled waters with a short and most eft'ect- 
ive exordium, how he disposed of the personalities involved, 
how he turned Hayne's allusion to Banquo's ghost to his own 
advantage, how he vindicated the North in its attitude to- 
ward slavery, those crushing sentences on internal improve- 
ments, the justification of his attitude on the tariff question, 
his eulogy of the South, and particularly South Carolina, 
his love for the entii'e Union, and then how ably he de- 
fended the true principles of the constitution — that this is a 
people's government derived from the people, that the States 
had no right to interpret Federal statutes, that in case of 
dispute the matter should be relegated to the courts, and 
that the doctrine of nullification involved as a last resort 
appeal to arms which was nothing short of treason — then 
the vivid picture of the militia of South Carolina marching 
to the custom house with General Hayne at their head, and 
last of all that splendid peroration, unsm'passed and unsur- 
passable, which will live so long as men love liberty and 
value country. Read the closing paragraph: 

When my eyes shall be turned for the last time to behold the sun 
in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored 
fragments of a once glorious Union, on States dissevered, discordant, 
belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched it may be in 
fraternal blood. Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather 
behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now known and honored 
throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies 
streaming in this original luster, not a stripe erased, not a single star 



28 

obscured; bearing for its motto no sucb miserable interrogatory as, 
What is all this worth? Nor those other words of delusion and folly, 
Liberty first and Union afterwards, but everywhere, spread all over 
its characters of living light, blazing on all its ample folds, as they 
float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the 
whole heavens, that other sentiment dear to every true American 
heart, Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable. 

When it is remembered that from the Senate chamber, in 
full view of the assembled audience and all the Senators, 
''Old Glory" was floating in the breeze, filled it seemed with 
the very spirit of the occasion, the effect of this never to be 
surpassed oration may be imagined, although never fully 
described. Massachusetts people grew a foot it is said in a 
single day; and all over the North men who had been terror- 
ized and cowed by the arrogance and insolence of the 
South acquired assurance and gained courage for the future. 
Thoughts which had lain dormant and expressionless were 
now crystallized and precipitated, and the spirit of National- 
ism from that hour became triumphant. 

Webster did not, of course, discover the fact that a nation 
had been created by the Constitution, and he was not the 
first to give voice to the doctrine of Nationalism, but he did 
put into words as no other could have done the fondest 
hopes and most fervent prayers of a patriotic people. 

Jefferson was not in a strict sense the author of the Dec- 
laration of Independence, but he rounded into form in his 
own inimitable way the feelings of the American colonists 
and launched the great ship of state. Webster stepped her 
masts and unfurled her sails to catch the dormant spirit of 
Nationalism. He furnished the insj)iration and sounded 



29 

the tocsin for the ''boys in blue," who rallied round his 
words and thundered from their guns the noble sentiment of 
"Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and insej^ar- 
able." This single sentence was Webster's message to his 
time and to all time. This was the shibboleth which led 
the American people to the terrible saci-ifices they were 
called upon to make for the perpetuity of the Union. 

If there be any apology for his "seventh of March 
speech," for his remaining in Tyler's cabinet after he had 
broken wdth his party, it is to be found in this thought that 
his passionate love of country sm'mounted everything. And 
it may be that Mr. Lincoln w^as actuated by the same motives 
when he declared that he would save the Union A\'ith slavery 
if he must, without slavery if he could, but at all events he 
should save the Union. 

We may well put aside all other events in Mr. Webster's 
life and there yet remains enough in this single and tri- 
umphant effort to give him high place on the nation's roll 
of honor. He as no other fully and completely expressed 
the hope and faith of the nation; and his name and fame will 
last as long as the Union survives. 

Horace E. Deemer 
Supreme Court Chambers 

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